We live above another property and our current neighbours (since June 2016, a couple) are the worst that we’re had in the time that we’ve been here (since Christmas 1997). They deliberately go out of their way to giving us the silent treatment and otherwise only ever wanting to engage with us when they have something to complain about and nothing else.

When they do feel like complaining about something, they leave us notes instead of actually talking to us face-to-face. The vast majority of these complaints consist of noise complaints. First, it was noises in the kitchen (our kitchen is directly above their bedroom), they leave us a note claiming that they soundproofed their room and wear earplugs while sleeping. They also like to claim that our music’s too loud. They leave us this note on this subject:

Hi <my mum’s name>

Last night I was awaken by loud music playing at 1 am, which was still on at 2.30 am when I managed to get back to sleep.

I would request that you please speak to your son again (me) and ask that he respects the rights of his neighbours to have a quiet evening and an undisturbed sleep. And that he immediately stops playing loud music throughout the evening/night.

This loud music has been constant, every night, over the last few months, and we have been very patient about it, but enough is enough. It is just downright rude and disrespectful to us and to your other neighbours.

I would suggest headphones if he insist on listening to loud music to avoid disturbing his neighbours. One off occasion of loud music/noise are to be expected but persistent noise particularly between the hours of 11 pm - 7 am is considered anti-social behaviour.

If it continues I will be forced to go down the route of contacting the police and the council anti-social behaviour team, but I would rather not have to do this.

Thanks

<name> and <name>

(As a side note, they stopped complaining after this as I kept the music low)

Then there was this one other time, my brother works nights and took a couple of weeks off holiday and since he normally doesn’t get to go out with friends at night, he brought a friend around after being out. When my brother was showing his friend out (you go through a hallway passing our neighbours door and then out into a garden area and up steps to get to our front door), the male neighbour comes out into the hall to see what the noise was. There was this other time that my mum was going out for something and bumped into her coming in. My mum tries to be polite and says hello to her. She flatly gives my mum a dirty look. Around about this time last year they get a dog. Almost quite literally every time you pass through the hallway it barks at us. Even after like a year it’ll still come up to you and bark at you like as if you’re a burglar or something. I mean, come on, I doubt that dogs are that stupid. At least in our case, wouldn’t the dog know after a while that there’s other people in the property?